Mod report - removed the head-banger cabinets

TABaker

Photomom said:

Has anyone actually mounted something under the cabinets to soften the impact? DH has slept in the camper 3 nights and banged his head all 3 nights. (He's tall.)

Yes, years ago several Dutchmen T@B owners added padding under the cabinets.  Photos on the Yahoo owners' forum.

abenteurer

My wife would remove me before removing the rear cabinets. I sometimes slightly bang my head once the first night and then I'm done. She never does but then she's much shorter. The cabinet arrangement is no problem for us.

Ferd

We were inspired by Tommy’s head-banger removal post and decided to do the same. We had only slept feet-to-front one night at “Camp Driveway” after receiving our Sofitel. After that night we decided to sleep wheel-to-wheel because of, well, head banging. I’m 6 feet and losing the two inches wasn’t really a problem. The problems were (a) my wife got tired of climbing over our Weimaraner and then me (and then vice versa) to go to the bathroom at night, (b) it’s more difficult to make the bed side-to-side, (c) no good places to put glasses at night and coffee in the morning for the one sleeping near the TV, and (d) we had to watch TV or read in one position in bed and then re-position when it was time to go to sleep.

I corresponded with Tommy a few times before starting the project and he was a great help with advice. The approach I decided to take was removal of most of the cabinets, and therefore most of the weight, and then doing the more important finishing cuts with most of the cabinet structure gone.

 Step 1 was to use a one inch drill bit to provide a hole to begin to cut a section of the cabinet in the back, about two inches from the speaker boxes. This also allowed for some practice with cutting to the back wall, which is the most difficult part of the project.

 I used a jigsaw for most of the cutting, but used a hack saw blade (no saw) to cut the last half inch or so near the back wall. The cuts were difficult because the birch veneer had not been glued securely to the plywood. To make matters easier I used a utility knife to cut and remove the veneer on the bottom before making the cuts. Good thing I did because removing the veneer revealed four screws in the plywood to the back wall.

 This picture shows the initial section removed. 

This picture from below shows the location of the screws.  

Step 2 was to construct and place a structure to support the weight of the cabinets.

Step 3 was to use a circular and jig saw to cut out most of the cabinets. During this step I cut the two vertical supports about 2 inches below the top horizontal piece of wood across the ceiling. This approach also turned out to be fortuitous because it revealed two screws in each support, as seen here. 

 Once the screws were removed the remaining vertical supports were easy to knock out with a tap from the hammer.

Step 4 was to carefully use a hand, then jig, then hack saw to cut along the sides of the remaining speaker boxes. The left side is more difficult because there is no good place to position yourself (if you are right handed) to make the cuts.

The final picture shows the almost-completed project. 

Tomorrow I plan to glue the drooping veneer to the plywood, and then once dry, hand sand to provide a smooth and straight surface. We are still deciding whether or not to take the Tommy approach and fashion new panels to cover the sides of the speaker boxes – they don’t look too bad without. We do plan to secure a strip of wood across the back to hide the screw holes. 

 Thanks again to Tommy both for the idea and the advice.

Tommy

You're welcome and awesome job Ferd! We have been such happy campers since we doing this. We just returned today from an eight-night trip without a single head bang to report

I hated to cut into such a beautiful cabinet and understand why a lot of of members couldn't do it - but the difference it has made has been remarkable. We also have a large dog (almost 90 lbs) and sleeping three-deep side to side was not going to work for so many reasons as you detailed.

Thanks for detailing your steps - I made a few mistakes that could have been avoided if I had followed your careful approach. If you do decide to fashion an inside panel to cover the cut board there is enough birch veneer on the bottom cabinet to make two of them if you're careful. My son who works with wood showed me a trick to getting a good curve - he held the veneer piece up to the curve on the *outside* trim of the trailer and traced the curve on the back of it with a pencil. Came out pretty close - just needed to do a little light sanding in places.